Brazil's slow pace of poverty reduction over the last two decades reflects both low growth and a low growth elasticity of poverty reduction. Using GDP data disaggregated by state and sector for a twenty-year period, this paper finds considerable variation in the poverty-reducing effectiveness of...

South Asia has attracted global attention because it has experienced rapid GDP growth over the last two decades. What is not so well known is that South Asia is the least integrated region in the world. South Asia has opened its door to the rest of the world but it remains closed to its...

This paper proposes a new method for ex ante analysis of the poverty impacts arising from policy reforms. Three innovations underlie this approach. The first is the estimation of a global demand system using a combination of micro-data from household surveys and macro-data from the International...

There has been a growing interest in what have come to be termed"multidimensional indices of poverty."Advocates for these new indices correctly point out that command over market goods is not all that matters to peoples'well-being, and that other factors need to be considered when quantifying...

This paper explores the reduction of food insecurity in Bolivia, adopting a supply side approach that analyzes the role of agricultural spending on vulnerability. Vulnerability to food insecurity is captured by a municipal level composite -- developed locally within the framework of World Food...

In this paper, a unique post-earthquake survey designed to provide a rapid assessment of food insecurity in Haiti is used in order to see how adequately emergency assistance programs have been allocated. When modelling the impact of various covariates upon assistance allocation, the location of...

This paper analyzes the impact of international remittances on poverty and household consumption and investment using panel data (2000 and 2007) from the Indonesian Family Life Survey. Three key findings emerge. First, using an instrumental variables approach to control for selection and...

This paper demonstrates that there are potentially large returns to having a social protection policy that stakes out a productive safety net below the vulnerable and keeps them from slipping into a poverty trap. Much of the value of the productive safety net comes from mitigating the ex ante...

High labor intensive (HIMO) public works programs have been very popular in recent years in Madagascar. They have been one of the most common safety net programs used in Madagascar to address poverty and vulnerability. The objectives of these programs are to provide income support to the poor...

This paper takes stock of the World Bank's risk and vulnerability analysis from FY2000 to FY2007. It complements recent assessments of Social Protection and Labor (SP&L) sector's lending and analytic activities on labor markets, pensions, social safety nets, and social funds. The review of 155...